Solar Cooking Symposium Focuses on Sustainability

For Release - July 23, 2009

July 20 was partly cloudy, but the organizers of the Sustainable Solar-Powered Cooking for Health Symposium at the University of New Mexico-Gallup had enough sun to cook lunch for the participants. Among the items sampled: rice, jambalaya stew with chicken, red and black beans, turkey sausage and mock crab.

Organized by Health Careers Professor Jeannie Martinez Welles, the symposium was attended by college personnel as well as locals interested in saving power while cooking. Among those on the program were Paul Funk, Ph.D., with the USDA Agricultural Research Service, who spoke on the growth of the solar cooking phenomenon worldwide; John Welles, NBCT, a Gallup High School instructor who gave a presentation on solar oven construction; Rosemary Anslow, an adjunct instructor at UNM-Gallup and a diabetes educator, who gave some notes and anecdotes on solar ovens; and Vicky Pablito, student and community health worker, who gave a talk on diabetes education through alternative cooking and her experience with the project since 2002.

The event was funded through a grant from the National Institutes of Health Biomedical and Behavioral Research Initiative at UNM-G, written by Kamala Sharma, a chemistry professor at UNM-Gallup.

 

Caption: From left, Simeon Funk and brother Micah Funk, sons of Solar Symposium presenter Paul A. Funk, prepare to sample some of the food prepared in solar ovens for the symposium participants. Participants also got a booklet that included information on ovens, oven construction and cooking tips, and even some recipes.